Meet America’s Number One Gun Salesperson

Last month set a new record for the number of background checks ever conducted during the month of June in the 17-year history of the National Instant Check System, prompting the Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms to declare that, for the seventh year in a row, Barack Obama is the best gun salesman in the United States.

“It’s a dubious honor for the president, I’m sure,” CCRKBA Chairman Alan Gottlieb chuckled. “After all, Barack Obama has been advocating all forms of gun control since before he was elected back in 2008, and the only thing that he has really ever accomplished is to push gun sales higher.”

Gottlieb cited data released Monday by the National Shooting Sports Foundation that said the NSSF-adjusted National Instant Check System (NICS) figure of 886,825 checks was the highest on record for the month of June since the system was inaugurated. It is up considerably over June 2014, when there were 805,571 NICS checks, according to the NSSF-adjusted data. This year’s second quarter figure was also the second highest in the system’s history, at 2,793,230 checks.

“Barack Obama is a heck of a gun salesman,” Gottlieb observed. “All he has to do is complain in an interview about his disappointment at not being able to push more gun control, and sales spike.”

“On the plus side,” he added, “this has brought more than $808 million into the federal aid to wildlife restoration program this year, according to figures from the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service. And it has brought many new people into the ranks of shooters and gun owners, including lots more women.”

“Under the Obama administration,” Gottlieb concluded, “the one industry that seems to have flourished throughout has been the firearms industry. His policies and pronouncements have resulted in higher gun and ammunition sales, more new gun owners, more jobs at retail gun shops and sporting good stores, and increased membership and support for gun rights organizations. Just keep talking, Mr. President. It’s good for the Second Amendment.”

With more than 650,000 members and supporters nationwide, the Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms (www.ccrkba.org) is one of the nation’s premier gun rights organizations. As a non-profit organization, the Citizens Committee is dedicated to preserving firearms freedoms through active lobbying of elected officials and facilitating grass-roots organization of gun rights activists in local communities throughout the United States.